Smartphone-Controlled Autonomous Car Is Just a Toy — For Now

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Smartphone-Controlled Autonomous Car Is Just a Toy — For Now

Three college kids in Australia have built an autonomous vehicle controlled by a smartphone.

To be fair, calling it a "vehicle" is a bit of a stretch. What Tommi Sullivan, Michael Lennon, and Yukito Tsunoda have made at Griffith University in Queensland is the coolest freaking Power Wheels you've ever seen. They used the same four-wheeled plastic toy we drove as toddlers and an Android smartphone to create a fully-functional autonomous "car" that took home the 2013 Queensland iAwards in Brisbane.

“A normal unmanned vehicle would usually use a camera or a different sensor or a Ladar [sic] on the top," said Sullivan, who's working on his bachelor's degree in information technology. "But the uniqueness in this car is that most of the sensors are used from the mobile phone.”

That meant using the headset's GPS system to plot a course and the camera to see lane markings, spot hazards, and analyze more finite information. Utilizing that data, the smartphone can send signals to a series of motors and 3D-printed parts to accelerate, turn, and stop the autonomous micro-machine.

The next step is to beef up the components, get bigger motors and actuators, and transfer the tech into a three-wheeled, tube-framed prototype they've already built.

“Our ultimate goal is to implement our program and drive the car in the public environment,” said Yukito. Scary. But awesome.